my take on books, kids, and the weirdness of life in general

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Happy Mother’s Day!

I’ve been thinking all week, trying to come up with a touching, brilliant tribute to my mom. But how much can you say about someone who has just always been there? I’ll give it a shot, anyway.

Before I started school, Mama was always there when I wanted someone to read me a book. Or even after I started school. I was reading Charlotte’s Web when I was seven or eight, sitting at the kitchen table while Mama washed dishes. I got to the end and started crying. I couldn’t finish it and asked Mama to finish reading it to me. She stopped what she was doing, put me in her lap and read the end of Charlotte’s Web to me.

She was always there to play a board game or work a puzzle with me. We loved our puzzles. For most of my childhood, we couldn’t eat at the table because we always had one puzzle or another in-process on it.

She was always there to go for a walk with me or take a bike ride.

She was always there to help me practice softball, and she never missed taking me to a team practice or attending a single game in the six years I played.

She was always there, watching from the front porch, as I stood across the road to catch the elementary school bus in the morning. We lived out in the country, but she was still going to watch out for her baby. She was always there when I came home in the afternoon, ready to hear about my day. She was always there to hold me and comfort me during those inevitable times when I encountered someone who didn’t want to be my friend. Of course, since she was my mama, she always told me, “It’s their loss.”

She was always there to teach me how to treat other people. “The Lord wants us to build people up, not tear them down.”

During my teen years, she was always there when my friends and I wanted to hang out at the house. We didn’t have a huge house, so most of the time, my parents would be sitting on the couch, giving up their TV for the evening while five or six of my closest friends and I sat at the card table in the middle of the room playing Rook.

When I got older and moved out, she was always there when I called to ask her if she wanted to go shopping with me. Groceries, clothes, whatever. It didn’t matter, we just enjoyed hanging out together.

She’s always been there for my dad. Through the past year and a half of chemo, radiation, surgery, hospital visits. She’s been there and been stronger than anyone should have to be. I’m so proud of her.

We don’t live close enough for that stuff anymore, but she’s always there when I call to chat or when Blake says, “Call Blamma and Papa.” He just wants to say, “I love you, Blamma”, but I think that’s okay with her.